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Alpin lowered his weapon and, leaving old Erland to be arrested by the guards, he sped towards the hall. Kenric, hearing that scream, followed after him. In the hall they found their mother. A crowd of the men and women of the castle were there with her, holding torches and lighted cruse lamps over the body of the dead lord of Bute. The Lady Adela was wringing her hands in frantic grief.
Better had you obeyed our good abbot, and gone upon the holy pilgrimage; better still had you remained content upon your isle of Gigha, and never sought, in your ambition, to wrest from your brother Hamish the larger inheritance that you coveted. But you slew our good Earl Hamish; you slew his son Alpin. Blame now yourself alone in that your folly led you to slay also your own son Lulach.
"Now have I got you at an advantage as you had me yesternight. But it shall never be said that Roderic of Gigha would meanly slay any man who was weaponless. And therefore take up your sword, Earl Alpin, and let us make an end of this battle." Roderic then drew back that Alpin might without hindrance take up his sword.
Then Alpin raised his hand and asked that the chain of silence should be shaken; and when one of the guards had shaken the rattling chains and all were listening with bated breath he took up and made his plea, demanding prompt justice on the slayer of his father. "And whom do you charge with this foul crime?" asked Sir Oscar Redmain, though indeed none needed to be told.
But Roderic sprang lightly aside, so that the young man's aim was spent upon the soft ground. Roderic's sword flashed in a circle above his crested helm. There was a dull crunching sound, and then a deep groan. Kenric promptly rushed to his brother's side and tried to raise him from the ground. But the sword of Roderic of Gigha had done its work. Earl Alpin was dead.
"Roderic, son of Alpin, what have you to say in defence for this grave crime whereof you are accused?" asked Sir Oscar Redmain when Alpin had told his tale. The two lads stepped back and Roderic took their place. His long golden hair as the sunlight fell upon it shone scarcely less bright than the well-wrought dragon that twined its scaled form upon his burnished helm of brass.
"Begone!" was her word, "take your shame out of my sight; leave me with clean folk. I am a daughter of Alpin! Shame of the sons of Alpin, begone!" It was said with so much passion as awoke me from the horror of my own bloodied sword. The two stood facing, she with the red stain on her kerchief, he white as a rag.
The sept of MacGregor claimed a descent from Gregor, or Gregorius, third son, it is said, of Alpin King of Scots, who flourished about 787. Hence their original patronymic is MacAlpine, and they are usually termed the Clan Alpine. An individual tribe of them retains the same name.
"Pardon him?" exclaimed Kenric. "No, never will I do that. If you slay him not, Alpin, then, by the holy rood, I myself will do so. But it shall be in fair fight that I will overcome him, and by no mean subterfuge." The two lads were now at the entrance of the larger hall, wherein the good Earl Hamish lay dead.
"And I am ready," said Alpin. "I will engage with you to the death. And God defend the right!" While Duncan Graham and one of the guards went back to the castle of Rothesay to bring the swords of Alpin and Roderic, Sir Oscar Redmain pronounced the assize at an end; and such as wished not to witness the deadly combat the abbot Godfrey and some few women went away.
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